The present invention is generally related to devices and methods for tracing electrical power circuits, or more particularly, for determining which of a plurality of circuit breakers controls a circuit of interest.
It is often desirable to disconnect electrical power to an electrical circuit which supplies a particular electrical outlet. Unfortunately, circuit breaker boxes are not always clearly marked as to which circuit breaker in the box controls the outlet of interest. When the outlet of interest is located remotely from the circuit breaker box, it can be time consuming and laborious for a person working alone to switch off each circuit breaker in succession and return to the location of the outlet of interest each time to determine whether the power has been disconnected.
A common way of reducing the effort involved in tracing a circuit to the controlling circuit breaker is to connect an electrical lamp to the outlet of interest and to watch it as each circuit breaker is switched off. This procedure will only work when the outlet of interest is located such that the lamp can be seen from the site of the circuit breaker box, which is usually not the case.
Another common expedient is to connect a sound emitting device, such as a radio, to the outlet of interest and to listen to it as each circuit breaker is switched off. This procedure will work with more remotely located outlets than will the lamp method described above, but may still not work in noisy environments or where the outlet is located extremely remotely, or sound impeding walls intervene.
Both of the above-described procedures have the common failing that the power-off indicating means is located at the site of the outlet of interest. It would be an improvement over the prior art to provide a power-off indicating means located proximate the circuit breaker box so that one could quickly try each circuit breaker in sequence and obtain an immediate local indication of whether power has been disconnected to the outlet of interest.